Apocalypse
by Lady Mayflower
Summary: It's the future, and everything's gone to hell. With Cartman's word as law, it'll take what's left of South Park all that they have just to survive, much less find a way to take down the iron fist.
1. Das Gelobte Land

_Hello, South Park! Your friendly neighborhood Mayflower is back and ready for action with the crappy, 21st-century remake of her original story, "Apocalypse: Cartman". (Yes, for the six of you that read that, the mysterious 'other version' is finally ready to unleash its terror onto the world. Prepare yourselves.)_

_Anyway, we have a prologue of sorts to get to (that's fanfiction code for "lower your expectations for Chapter 1" XD), so I'll try to keep this brief. I just want to throw out a quick thank you to one of my beta-readlets, **Strange Liou**, without whom none of this would be possible, because she helped me to discover the missing piece of the puzzle that was holding this story back; its damn ending. XD If there are any YuGiOh! readers in the audience, do yourselves a favor and check her stuff out. It's pretty awesome._

_Alright, bragging about how much I love my readlets over. XD ON WITH THE SHOW!_

**LAWYERBOT SAYS: "Man, this story's been on hiatus for so long, I almost forgot how to care about it."  
><strong>South Park, both the show and its inhabitants, (c) Comedy Central  
>Comedy Central (c) Trey Parker and Matt Stone<p>

All characters and events in this fanfiction, even those based on real people, are entirely fictional.  
>The following story contains coarse language, and due to its content, should not be read by anybody.<p>

WARNING: This story contains usage of the German language. Which I do not speak. XD I am doing the best I can, but please respect that my German may not be perfect. (To be fair, though, neither is Cartman's; if it bugs you that much, pretend I'm doing it on purpose.)

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><p><strong>CHAPTER ONE: Das Gelobte Land<strong>

_The Promised Land_

I hate boats. Why do I get seasick so easily? Leave it to Kyle Broflovski to find a way to throw up when he hasn't eaten in two or three days.

Still, I'll take a little seasickness over ANYTHING they had back in Germany. The salty air of the Atlantic doesn't have shit on the smell of factories and death camps. I can still see the smokestacks from here; it's like there's this black cloud of death hanging over the whole country.

Then again, a lot of places are like that now, I hear - ever since Cartman took over, most of the world's gone to hell.

I know we all grew up with the stories of how bad the Holocaust was, but I never thought I'd actually experience it first-hand. And it was all thanks to someone I knew, someone who grew up with the same stories I did...hell, someone I USED to consider a friend sometimes.

We all knew Cartman was crazy. We all knew he was a hateful bastard. We all knew that adults are stupid and fall for his tricks. Why didn't we see this coming? One junior-internship with the mayor started it all. Then he moved to Washington, DC, and we thought we'd never have to hear his whining and bitching ever again. We couldn't have been more wrong.

He came back, alright. With his own personal army.

I'll never forget that day, just under a year ago. It was the last time Ike and I saw our parents, the last time I got to see Stan and Kenny and the rest of the gang. We all heard stories about crazy takeovers happening in the south, schools being raided, blacks and Jews and redheads and handicaps and Latinos being kidnapped left and right...but that was in the south. Texas, Arizona, Alabama, Mississippi...who would've thought that mess would make its way to Colorado?

But it did. It was a firefight from the second they stormed into town. Parents were rushing into school left and right to save their kids. I still have marks on my wrists from Stan trying to drag me along when his parents came for him. We didn't know at the time why Mrs. Marsh refused to take me along. Now I get it - I still don't LIKE it, but I get it.

I remember how the last kids in my classroom were me, Jimmy, Timmy, and Token. Token managed to sneak out, right before Cartman's neo-Nazis came in and dragged me out. I still have no idea what happened to Jimmy and Timmy, but I can only imagine.

Right before they threw Ike and I onto their cattle-truck, Cartman pulled me aside. I hate it when he knows he's winning; he has this cocky look on his face that just makes me want to punch all of his teeth in. "Well, well, well, if it isn't _mein Jude,_" he laughed. "Did ya miss me, Kahl? Did ya?"

With his goons holding me back, he stole my jacket and used his pocket-knife to cut a bloody swastika into my arm, deep as the knife would go. "Make sure nothing happens to this one, _verstehen?_" After putting his knife away, he grabbed my face with those fat, grubby hands of his, squeezing my cheeks like your grandmother does to embarrass you. "I wanna save lil' Kahl 'ere fer last."

I remember cursing Cartman out at the top of my lungs, all the way until they shut the door on the cattle truck with Ike and I inside of it. It didn't make a difference; _none_ of us could make a difference.

My group was heading to Germany. As we got down the road, we saw another truck just before it split off from ours. I found out later that it had all of the older people Cartman captured, anyone over thirty-something that wouldn't be useful much longer. (Really, why did history have to be Cartman's best subject? I thought we were joking when we said Cartman could recite the timeline of World War II.) Seeing how it just came from South Park, I wouldn't be surprised if Mom and Dad were in there. I hate being the pessimist, but...let's just say Ike and I aren't about to go looking for them anytime soon.

Arbeitsdorf. Leave it to Cartman to be so bastardy and so lazy at the same god-damn time that he would just rebuild the concentration camps that Hitler put down in the 1940s. That stone and wire fence was our prison; for Ike and I, it was about a year. For the others, it was even longer, and it'd still be even longer.

6:00AM; the morning wake-up call. Report to the middle yard for counting and announcements.

6:15AM; count's over, head to the mess hall for breakfast.

7:00AM; get to positions and get to work.

7:00PM; back to the mess hall for dinner.

8:00PM; dinner's over, time to clean up and hit the showers.

9:00PM; lights-out for the younger kids, older kids go back to work.

Midnight; total lights-out.

Every. Damn. Day. I feel like I always know what time it is now, just because I'm so set to this god-damned schedule. I couldn't even get to sleep when Ike and I made it to the boat; it was 7AM, when I should've been up and working.

But leave it to Cartman to put the icing on the 'fuck you!' cake. See, I was expecting the hard work schedules. I was expecting the uniforms. I was expecting the new label as "Prisoner 1286". I was expecting the drafty barracks. I was expecting the cold showers. I was expecting the poorly-made meals.

Cartman added the piece to the puzzle that I WASN'T expecting - this damn swastika on my arm. The one that was cut so deep, it never healed properly. The scar I'm going to have for the rest of my life.

I got special treatment. And yes, I'm complaining about it. Where the older guys were sent to the weapons factory next door and the little kids were off making clothes and doing simple work, I was back at camp, doing housework and kitchen duties with the girls. There was no real reason behind it; I may not be big and strong, but I'm definitely tough enough to keep up with other guys my age. I asked a guard about it one day. He told me I was _safer _at the camp.

I was being baby-sat.

I was in the nicest of the three bunkers, the one with the little kids. I got extra blankets when I got sick. I never got whipped for being late. The guards never picked on me, and anyone in the camp who did got their asses handed to them.

Everyone knew I was getting special treatment. And the only thing they could pin it on was this damn swastika, the one I wasn't allowed to cover up with my shirt sleeves. Rumors were EVERYWHERE - stories that I was a spy, stories that my parents were Nazis, stories that Cartman and I were best friends...

And unfortunately, that last one used to be true. And the kids I went to Jewbilee with, the ones that knew I grew up in South Park, made sure every last kid in that camp knew it. Just because the guards were instructed to beat the bloody hell out of anyone caught picking on me, it didn't stop some of those bigger guys from trying.

The worst one was in the showers one night. The boys had snuck some knives from the mess hall, and as soon as they spotted me, beat me against the wall and hacked off as much of my hair as they could before the guards turned off the water and called everyone out. I had a black eye and bruises everywhere for weeks, and even now, you can still see where I'm missing chunks of bright red curl.

_"Where's your buddy now, ya kike?" "Why isn't big, scary Cartman sticking up for you now, daywalker?" "Maybe we should give you a few more scars to match that one, huh?" _I can practically still hear them now. Right when I thought getting beaten up in the locker-room for missing a free-throw was the worst thing ever.

Eventually, though, the animosity stopped. The kids stopped crying in the middle of the night, the boys stopped rioting, the foiled escapes stopped happening. One by one, I could look around the mess hall and see the broken pieces laying around. In just a few months, you could tell when the new recruits were in. They have the same look we did on that first day, with fire in their eyes and rebellion in their souls. The older kids were done, you could see it just as easily. They shuffled through their motions, nobody complaining about the food or how cold the shower was.

They gave up.

I didn't. Who's the little baby now?

It took me a while to get the plan together, but things couldn't have gone smoother once I did. When it was my turn to clean up the kitchens, I held onto some of the leftovers and let it spoil for a few days. Then, when it came my turn to cook, I mixed some of the mess into the stew we were serving to the older boys. One, that felt DAMN good after all of the harassment those guys put me through, but two, it got most of that barrack sick with food poisoning, meaning the guards were distracted. The girls and I were put on nurse-duty, cleaning out bedpans and replacing sheets and whatnot; all I had to do was sneak Ike into my laundry basket and duck out while the night guards were stuck tending to the mini-epidemic happening across the camp.

It was a long road from Arbeitsdorf, but being careful to stick to the forests and away from the roads, we made it to the border. One sneaky net-climb later, and Ike and I are on a shipping boat en route to New York. Turns out security's actually a lot lighter under Cartman's control (though he was always the type to bitch about taking his shoes off at the airport, the fat bastard). I grabbed fresh shirts for Ike and I that didn't have prisoner numbers, then turned my old shirt into a bandana to hide my hair. Nobody on the boat gave us a second look; all we had to do was avoid the passport checks at the gates and watch out for night guards lurking around the storage bay Ike and I were calling home.

I turned away from the water, wiping off my mouth and taking a few deep breaths to try and make my stomach calm down. _We made it this far,_ that's all I could think about. A year in the camps, two weeks in the German wilderness, and three days on a German shipping barge; hard to believe we're only two days away from making it back to the states.

At least..._I'm _going back to the states.

"You done throwing up out here, bro?"

I couldn't help but jump a little. "Ike, don't sneak up on me like that!"

Ike just laughed as he hopped over and joined me by the railing. I always forget how big he's gotten, then remember when he comes and stands right next to me. He comes up to my shoulder now, and he's looking to pass that any day now. I still catch myself thinking he's still three years old, barely babbling and just the right size to be kicked through a window.

So hard to believe he's twelve now. Twelve years old, and enough torture to last a lifetime.

But you'd never know it by looking at him; it's like there's this brightness in those little black eyes of his, knowing that no matter how crazy things get, big brother Kyle's going to make it alright, just like I promised the very first day in the camps.

Said black eyes turned to me when he noticed I was zoning a bit. "Seriously, Kyle, you alright?"

"You need a haircut," I pointed out, noticing how his messy black hair was starting to hang in his face.

"Don't you think we have bigger problems to worry about than my hair?"

"Yeah, I'm just saying."

He laughed; ever since we got sent to the camps, laughter was his new answer to everything. Who knows, maybe it helped him deal with all this craziness. "Kyle, you're such a dork."

"Oh, and you're not?" I teased, grabbing at Ike's sides. He gave a little squeal before trying to shake me off; he hates it when I do that, but god-dammit, I can't help picking on him sometimes.

I gave him a few moments to calm down. Since we were so close to the states and it was already on my mind, I decided this would be as good a time as any to break the news. "Hey, Ike?"

"Yeah, bro?"

"Y'know that story I'm making you memorize?"

"Yeah."

"Lemme hear it."

Ike sighed, looking upwards for a second until the pieces of his alibi came back to him. "My name is Peter Gintz. My parents were just taken out in a town raid, and now I'm heading to live with my Uncle Harry and Aunt Elise in Quebec. I grew up in the United States, even though I'm Canadian by blood, and I'm Roman Catholic." At the end, he turned back to me. "Did I forget anything?"

"Nope; A-plus again, little bro."

"Why are you making me memorize that again?"

With a sigh, I dragged Ike closer to me, putting an arm around his shoulder. "I was going to wait to tell you, but I guess now's a good a time as any."

"What?"

"Ike, when we get off the boat in New York, you're heading back to Canada."

"...Not _we're _heading to Canada?"

"No, Ike - YOU'RE heading to Canada. Without me."

"What? But why?"

I put a finger to his lips before he started attracting the attention of the crew. "Ike, listen," I shushed. "Canada's safe; from what I've heard, Cartman hasn't destroyed it yet. I scrounged up some money for you, so I want you to get a fake passport and catch a train to Quebec. Try as hard as you can to find out where your birth parents are, or anyone else that'll take care of you while I'm gone, okay?"

"And what are you going to be doing that I can't come with you?" Ike frowned.

"Don't worry about me; I've got a plan." (Hey, it was partially true; I DID have a plan, just not a good one.) "When we hit New York, you worry about you, okay?"

"Kyle, I can't just go out without you! What if something happens and I never see you again?"

"Hey, hey; have I ever let you down before?"

"No..."

"Then don't worry about it," I tried to reassure him, ruffling up that heap of black hair with my hand. "Look, the most important thing you need to focus on is staying somewhere safe until things settle down a bit, okay? I know it's crazy, but-"

"I'm going to go take a walk," he interuppted, slipping away from my arm and storming down the deck.

I decided to let him go. It DID sound pretty harsh, expecting a twelve-year-old to give up the only family he has left and make a new name for himself in Canada. But in my mind, it still sounded better than the alternative; forcing that twelve-year-old to stay with his marked-for-death brother. If I wanted ANY chance at keeping Ike and I safe and giving him a real home to finish growing up, I needed to figure something out. I needed some way to avoid Cartman, if I couldn't just take him out altogether. And in my mind, that added up to one thing:

_I needed to get back to South Park._

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><p><em>Alright, THAT part's over with. XD Fun stuff starts next chapter! ...Kind of! I think? Hey, there's only one way to find out! And that's to tune in next time! Make sure to review 'til then! Thanks for reading! :)<em>

_**_§ Tucker's Mayflower, signing off! §_**_


	2. Schutzengel

_Hello, South Park! Mayflower here, and guess what? It's the summer of fanfiction! Whoo! Y'know what that means? Time to mad-update all of the things, then make them super-pretty with images! So let's just cut the chitter-chatter - we have a war to get to! On with the show!_**  
><strong>

**LAWYERBOT SAYS: "_Somethin' 'bout summer, too lazy to look up a reference!~_"  
><strong>South Park, both the show and its inhabitants, (c) Comedy Central  
>Comedy Central (c) Trey Parker and Matt Stone<p>

All characters and events in this fanfiction, even those based on real people, are entirely fictional.  
>The following story contains coarse language, and due to its content, should not be read by anybody.<p>

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><p><strong>CHAPTER TWO: Schutzengel<strong>

_Guardian Angel_

Another day. Another long day of destruction and murder and chaos. Another long-ass day of having Cartman bitching in my ear for hours on end.

I stretched out my back while stuck waiting for the cross-light on my way home. This job's making me old, I swear. If I weren't already blonde, I'd start looking for grays. Sometimes I wonder why I put up with all of this shit. I mean, the perks of being at the top of the food chain are pretty sweet, but I can't help but wonder why Butters and I put ourselves through this.

Especially Butters. I really refuse to believe that ol' Chaos is Cartman's bitch, but I'm running out of other things to explain it. Then again, that's the way it's been since we were kids. Ever since I took that little "terminal illness" vacation and Butters became the new 'number four', he's been the stuttering ace in Cartman's pocket.

I guess if you think about it, the bigger surprise is how _I _ended up in this mess. People have this weird idea that Cartman and I are tighter than we really are. (Then again, I guess that's what happens when you hang out with super-besties like Stan and Kyle. Those two could make ANYONE into a third wheel.) I mean, personally? I hated Cartman's guts before this Nazi revolution thing started. To this day, I can't figure out why he invited me to come to DC for his big takeover scheme.

Don't get me wrong, it was sweet as all hell. I don't even question how Cartman pulls off the crazy things he pulls off, but getting a grand tour of the Pentagon was amazing. It's the kind of place hood-rats like me don't really think about getting to see, y'know? I just wish I had more time to take it all in; it's kind of hard to sight-see when Butters is blathering like an idiot and Cartman's trying to explain his plans for world domination.

PIggybacking off of the Occupy movements and the war in the Middle East? Using terrorists and the royal fucking-up of Europe as fear tactics? Scapegoats and bandwagon methodology? Almost every word that Cartman said went straight over my head, but politics and history was always kind of his thing. It's like when you get Stan talking fantasy football or Kyle talking poetry or science-y crap.

Ugh. Another red light, another chance to stretch my back, another sick pitfall in my stomach. Kyle. Every Jew joke in the fuckin' book, from Cartman AND me, and I was the moron that didn't connect "concentration camp" and "your best friend is Jewish". Well, I mean, I DID - it just happened to be AS the trucks were pulling out of South Park.

I want to be mad. I'm mad at Cartman, I'm mad at his followers, I'm fuckin' mad at myself. But what am I doing about it? Not a damn thing. If there's one thing Cartman has mastered, it's making a deal that's too sweet to turn down. My parents got their big house with all of the fancy stuff they could only bitch about not having, I got a safe place with food and electricity to take care of Karen, the McCormicks would never have to worry about bills or debt or poverty for the rest of our lives...and all I had to do was put up with Cartman's bullshit? Hell, I was already doing that for free. (There was also the move to Houston, Cartman's major HQ, but fuck Colorado, it sucked up there anyway.) If it could help out my family, I'd do-

Whoa! I throw my arms out, nearly losing my balance as I trip over myself. Almost walked out into the street without checking the light. Seeing that it's red, I get back on my feet and take a step back. (Yeah, I know it's fuckin' late and the roads are deserted. Shut the hell up.)

Alright, so Cartman wasn't the BEST thing that happened to the family. Or my inattentiveness, for that matter - you have no idea how bad I miss the days where I could just walk into traffic and not give a damn. But, y'know, maybe it was my fault. Maybe I should've just kept Mysterion in the bottom of the sock drawer where he belonged.

You can't blame me for being stupid, though, right? I was pissed off after I found out what happened to Kyle. Sending your own best friend to a concentration camp? Telling all of your guards to keep an eye on the ginger with the swastika scar because you're saving him to be the last Jew killed? Cartman had outdone his own dickishness by a long shot, and the vigilante in me wasn't going to let him live it down.

For a while, it was alright. (If anything, it was kind of funny. My reincarnation act actually started rumors that there were an ARMY of Mysterions, kind of like suicide bombers trying to terrorize Cartman's empire.) Every night, I took a few more Cart-nazis off the streets, then woke up comfortably in my house after a round of bullets to the face, ready to go to work the next day. I was the ultimate double-agent.

Then the fat bastard figured it out.

Ever since I realized my immortality, I've been doing everything I can to prove it to other people. Now the secret's out, and I really miss those days when everyone would just blink and forget about it. Cartman's too damn smart, though - I really should've known that if anyone would get it, it'd be him. He bugged my house, bugged his soldiers, bugged the streets...it was only a matter of time before all of the videos came together and shit added up.

He tried to be sneaky about it. Offered me a big promotion, gave me the chance to go knock heads on the battlefields, since the revolution was getting pretty damn bloody in some of the bigger cities of the world. The second the words "shove it up your ass" left my mouth, I heard the gunshots. "A'right, po' boy. If I don' get to use yer lil' never-say-die magic trick, neither do you."

I could almost FEEL what had happened, way before Cartman spun me around and I saw Mom strapped to a chair with a bloody face full of lead. Not that Cartman just shot up my mom, I couldn't give a fuck less about THAT part.

The part that got me was that Cartman just took my immortality.

I have no idea how my power works now that Mom's not in the picture to rebirth me every night. Honestly? I REALLY don't want to find out. It's the biggest shock treatment I could imagine. Living life WITHOUT the comfort that nothing can hurt you? (Well, hurt in the loosest sense of the word.) Knowing you could die at any second?

Nerve-wracking. I even stopped wearing my parka 'cause I heard it's how bad luck finds me.

I give an annoyed sigh as I haul up the steps to the front door. This house is gorgeous, don't get me wrong, but I fuckin' hate it now. It's way too big for me and Karen (Dad and Kevin disappeared a little after Mom died), so it's just this GIANT fuckin' reminder of where I'm stuck at the moment.

I'm Kenny McCormick, left-hand bitch of the Cartman empire.

Normally, the house is pitch-black and quiet when I walk in. I work a lot of late nights, and I've been doing my damnedest to keep Karen in school (especially since she's going to a fancy private one and not South Park junior high), so she's usually in bed by now.

Tonight was different. I could hear the buzz of the TV when I opened the door, and its bright blue light followed as soon as I got inside. "Karen? You still up?"

"In here, Ken."

I kicked off my coat and shoes and all, then headed over to the pile of blankets on the couch that I _assumed _was my baby sister. "Hey, it's a Thursday," I pointed out, reaching through the blankets until I found Karen's mess of dirty-blonde hair and royally fucked it up. "You should be in bed, missy."

Karen wasn't in the mood to play tonight. "Sorry, I couldn't sleep. I heard guns nearby, so I came downstairs to check the news and see where the fight was."

I bit my lip. Right, that was the strike Cartman ordered on the ghetto earlier. Something about intelligence reporting an underground railroad of Mexicans that were sneaking through the border. Why the hell you'd stop ANYTHING anti-Cartman in HOUSTON, or anywhere REMOTELY Texas, was beyond me. "Hey, I thought I told you not to worry about those. The soldiers don't come through this part of town, you're fine."

"I wasn't worried about me," she tsked, gathering her blankets now that the newscast had ended. "I was worried about THEM."

"...Oh."

She sighed. "Ken, when is a superhero gonna show up and make the world better again?"

I HATE when she asks me this things. She still doesn't know about me and Mysterion, and god-dammit, I'm keeping it that way 'til I'm old and on my death bed. (Y'know, the one that counts.) "Karen, I told you - I know the Cartman thing seems kind of crazy, but you just-"

"I don't want to just ride out the storm," she huffed. "I want my guardian angel to come back and do his job. I haven't seen him in forever."

"...Karen, not even your crazy dream angel could stop Cartman now."

"He could at least try." Clearly, this wasn't about to go away, but I AM the older brother, so she's decent enough to at least listen when I say 'bedtime'. She gave me a quick kiss before rolling up her blankets and heading upstairs. "G'night, Ken! Love you!"

I counted to five after I heard Karen's door shut upstairs, just to make sure she was out of the way, then hopped the back of the couch and sat down. I flipped to another news channel, just watching half-assed while they scrolled through the major headlines of the day. On top of the underground railroad strike, there was a salmonella outbreak in one of the Germany camps, a police riot in London, an undesirables raid in Seattle, another hurricane looking to crush Florida...

Karen was right. The world IS a mess.

I can't help but feel so useless, though. I can't do anything to stop this. Hell, I'm partially RESPONSIBLE for all of this. (I mean, I'll blame Butters for shit ten times out of ten, but I really can't deflect all of the blame here.)

I shut off the TV, then head upstairs to my room. Instead of crashing into bed, though, I head over to my dresser. Like I said, Mysterion's been hiding in the sock drawer since the Rodeo Square incident. His last official sighting before he had his powers taken away and went underground like a pussy. Feeling that pit in my stomach again, I have to pull the costume out, just for nostalgia's sake. I haven't even touched it since Rodeo Square, not even to bust through the window and be Karen's guardian angel like I did when we were kids.

I haven't had the heart. I can only imagine what she'd say. "Mysterion, I'm so disappointed in you! You're the worst guardian angel ever! Millions of people need your help right now, and you're hiding! This isn't the Mysterion I remember! This isn't the angel that saved me from my drunk parents and bullies at school when I was little!"

And once again, she'd be right. I'm NOT the superhero that fought off Cthuthu, I'm NOT the guardian that saved his baby sister from bullying and abuse. I'm just some nobody who let a jerk like Cartman go way too far. I don't deserve to even be holding this damn costume, much less ever wear it again.

...That's when it finally hits me.

Ever since Mom died, I've been terrified of dying. What kind of pussy am I? I'm Kenny McCormick, dammit! I'm the biggest daredevil South Park's ever fuckin' seen! I've died so many times, I'm buddy-buddy with Satan! I've been to Hell, Heaven, Ry'leh, and everywhere in between. I've been burned, stabbed, shot, eaten, exploded, struck by lightning, zombified, and I'm SURE there's eighty things on that list I can't even think of right now! Not to mention, I'm a fuckin' vigilante. Batman ain't got nothin' on my shit. I would go to Hell and back to protect my friends and my sister, and I've fuckin' done it, too.

And I'm afraid of DYING? In this fucked-up world that I don't even want to live in?

Enough is enough. I'm not playing Cartman's game anymore. I don't need to be alive for Karen if I can make this world sane enough for her to live in. That involves putting power back where it was before Cartman got his grubby hands all over it.

I pack my bags, deciding to bring the Mysterion garb along. The green question mark needs to fly over the city again. Then I leave a note for Karen explaining I got called away for a "business trip" and to not expect me back soon.

I'm going on a trip, alright. If I'm going to make things right, I need to start with the best resistance there is. That means I'm making a trip to South Park, Colorado.

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><p><em>Methinks I see some paths about to cross here. Will we ever return to South Park? Where are the missing members of our quartet? Why am I teasing you with cliffhangers you clearly know the answer to? Whatever the reason, tune in next time! Thanks for reading!<br>_

__**_§ Tucker's Mayflower, signing off! §_**__


	3. Der Widerstand Lebt Auf

_Hello, South Park! I'm ba~ack! Sorry about the wait, guys - priorities are inappropriately prioritized. XD Anyway, we got a lot of story to get to, and I've kept you waiting for it long enough! Let's get this show on the road!  
><em>

**LAWYERBOT SAYS: "Oh, really? We're still doing this?"**  
>South Park, both the show and its inhabitants, (c) Comedy Central<br>Comedy Central (c) Trey Parker and Matt Stone

All characters and events in this fanfiction, even those based on real people, are entirely fictional.  
>The following story contains coarse language, and due to its content, should not be read by anybody.<p>

* * *

><p><strong>CHAPTER THREE: Der Widerstand Lebt Auf<strong>

_La Resistance Lives On_

"Are they still following us?"

"Yes, they're still following us! Hurry and get the fuck inside!"

"What's taking so long?"

"The door's stuck!"

"FUCK THE DOOR!" _Slam!_

"Oh, sure, you want to wake up the rest of the neighborhood while we're at it?"

"Shut up and get inside!"

Everyone shut up once we were all inside. I was the last one, so it was my duty to hold the door shut and listen for the all-clear. The entire room held their breath as I pushed my ear against the door. I could hear the soldiers just outside, but after a few angry snaps of German, they stormed off.

"All clear." The room gave a big sigh of relief.

"We did it!" Token cheered.

"Yeah, no thanks to you fucking with the door," Craig grumbled. Of course, he was the first to beeline for the kitchen, but I can't blame him. I think we ALL need a beer after that one.

I wasn't expecting security to be so tight at the drop-zone. Cartman's been putting South Park security on the back-burner lately, so I guess he figured it was time for a cop buff. "Yo, Mole, we're gonna need a new route into the train-yard."

Mole lit up a new cigarette before answering, "I tol' you, Marsh, we NEED a better way of getting zupplies than ztealin' from ze train-lines. I don' know if we c'n GET a new route to ze train-yard; Car'man may be onto us."

"Oh, both of you shut it," Craig spat, tossing me a bottle. "We'll talk spit in the morning. Can we PLEASE take the night off?"

"Guys, where did we hide the bandages?" I heard Clyde yell from the kitchen. Shit, I almost forgot he got grazed by that line of fire on the way out.

"They're right next to the 'next time, be less fat and you won't get shot'," Craig sneered, tearing the cap off his bottle.

"Thanks, Tucker, you're a bro!"

Gregory ran off to make sure Clyde wasn't about to bleed to death all over the kitchen, so the rest of us just sat back and laughed. That's the kind of friendship you pick up when you spend so many years locked in the basement with the same group of dick guys.

I looked around to do a quick headcount (which was sadly getting easier by the day). We've had a lot of missions go sour lately, so it never hurts to double-check: me, Craig, Gregory, Mole, Clyde, Token, Alex, Damien, Jason, Mark...

And considering we lost Tweek and Pip last week, that's all that's left. Ugh. From all of South Park down to ten guys. How does this happen? How does an entire town get steamrolled like this, all in a year?

...What, I have to answer that? It's the same thing that causes EVERY problem in South Park: Cartman being a dumbass douchebag.

I took a long swig of my drink, then headed upstairs. It's tense missions like that one that really wear me out. The boys know the deal by now, so nobody even looks when they hear me hit the creaky old stairs. We have our boundaries set up by now, and everyone knows the upstairs is my territory. That's the perks of bunkering in your best friend's old house first, I guess - I don't have to share room with everyone else.

My hand falls back to its nervous habit of pinching my nose as I get up the stairs and slip inside what used to be my best friend's bedroom. It's mine now, technically, but I've tried to keep it as Kyle as possible. I haven't moved a thing with the exception of bringing my stuff in, and I've even gone through the trouble of folding and organizing everything, all to keep Kyle's OCD in check.

I'm getting way too old for this. And I have no right to be saying that, but I am. I'm not even twenty yet, but I've already got bags under my eyes and gray hairs that're never going away after this bullshit. I put down my drink, then start tearing off clothes 'til I'm in nothing but boxers and a wife-beater. Well...those and the silver Star of David I've got around my neck. Just one more piece of Kyle I can't let go.

I push open the window, then grab my drink again. Sometimes it's nice to just sit and enjoy the breeze, y'know? Granted, I miss the days where the breeze wasn't smoggy, but what can you do?

I miss EVERYTHING about the old days. I miss going to school. I miss fighting with my sister and my parents. I miss having sleepovers with Kyle, I miss going on dates with Wendy. Hell, I even miss getting to call Cartman a fat-ass. It's so much less satisfying when you can't do it to his face.

Fuckin' Cartman. Just hearing the NAME gets me riled up and pissed off. He's the one that had to go and fuck everything up, as usual. And I was stupid enough to think we were done with his ass when he moved to Washington, DC.

I'll never forgive Cartman for what happened that day. It was total chaos, and it wasn't even third period. It was like 9/11 all over again; every thirty seconds, some kid was getting called to the office to go home, and no one would tell us what the fuck was going on. I couldn't even get the story out of Mom. I mean, I did later, but that was AFTER she had to literally tear me away from my best friend and I threatened to beat the shit out of her for not telling me why we couldn't bring Kyle home with us.

Kyle, Jimmy, Timmy, and Token - they were the last ones when lunch came around, or at least that's what Token saw. He managed to sneak out right before the nazis showed up, the lucky bastard. He told me there were gunshots on his way out, so we assumed the worst for those three. Especially after Cartman decided to give me Kyle's necklace to rub the whole thing in my nose.

But no! Killing my best friend wasn't going far enough. Taking over South Park wasn't enough. Gunning down most of our parents and shipping the prisoners to fuckin' Germany wasn't enough. Being the most psychotic asshole in history just wasn't fuckin' enough.

I look over at Kyle's dresser. So I lied - I did add ONE thing to the room. It's a pink knit hat, and it's hanging on a nail up at the top of the mirror. Kind of like the Star of David necklace, that pink hat's all I have left. All of those years, all of the ups and downs, all of the kisses and long walks and movie nights and clubhouse parties...and all I can show for it is a pink knit hat.

I should've known Wendy was going to get herself hurt. I should've rushed over to her place the second I found out the story. Instead, I had to hear about the standoff from Craig - "yo, Marsh, your girlfriend's fuckin' the police up at the school," like it was the breast cancer fight all over again or something. By the time I got up there, it was too late. Wendy did what Wendy did best: run her mouth about politics and whatever junk, then get Cartman pissed off. I mean, I love her for her brain, I really do, but you'd think she could turn off the super-activist while staring down a line of nazi-soldiers with guns.

I let him kill my best friend. I let him kill my girlfriend. Hell, not just my girlfriend - Wendy was the love of my life. I know it's cheesy to think a relationship that started in the third grade could hold up (especially after all of the times I threw up on her at the beginning), but it happens. I couldn't find a girl to replace Wendy if I tried. Beautiful, intelligent, confident, ambitious, generous...what more could you possibly ask for? I was going to ask her to marry me one day; now I won't get the chance.

Point is, you're damn straight he's not getting anyone else if I have a say about it.

That's why I started La Resistance. (Or...RE-started La Resistance, I guess. I never thought the group would go from fighting with Kyle's mom to avenging the death of her and her family.) We bunkered down in Kyle's old house (since Cartman knew it was abandoned - fatass never bothered to double-check), and we've been raising Hell ever since. Housing refugees, stealing from supply trains, freeing prisoners, bombing nazis - you name it, we've done it.

That's why I keep that little pink hat on the mirror, where I can see it every day. That's why I wear Kyle's necklace, even though wearing Jewish symbols is illegal six ways to Sunday. I'm doing it for them.

_I'm doing it to make Cartman pay._

x.x.x

"Yo, Marsh! Hurry up and get down here! We gotta talk spit!"

I stretch my back as I make my way down to the basement, where we've set up our war-room. (I mentioned I'm way too old for this, right?) We took this a lot less seriously back in the day, so we made up crazy code names for just about everything. I dunno, makes us sound more bad-ass or something. 'Talk spit' is one of them - it's our way of saying "we need to talk about fucking Cartman's day."

While Mole was busy trying to map out a new way into the train-yards (after bitching me out in six languages, like he usually does when I give him something to do before his morning cigarette), the rest of us had a major job on our hands: the Burning Man festival.

"Alright, do we know where Burning Man's at yet?" I started, plopping down in Mr. Brovflovski's fancy lawyer chair. (What can I say? I set up the table, so I got to pick my chair first.)

"Cartman's goons have already started setting up," Token jumped in, scrolling away on his laptop. "We're definitely looking at the Black Rock Desert."

"He's probably hoping some wanderers just show up and land in the bear-trap," Craig snorted.

"Do we have any traces of the prisoner ships yet?"

"Negative, but it sounds like there's going to be a ton of them."

"Well, Cartman DID say this was going to be his next Auschwitz," Gregory jumped in.

"Please don't say Auschwitz," I groaned, pinching my nose. Hearing anything that even SOUNDS like a concentration camp makes me sick.

"Apologies, but you know what I mean. My guess would be he's going to empty out the prisons and knock them all off in one swift go."

"Which means we'll probably find Tweek and Pip in that mess." Clyde winced slightly as his own words came back and re-processed. "Y-Y'know, considering-"

"Tweek and Pip are fine," I reassured. "Trust me, I know Cartman. If there's one thing he loves, it's rubbing shit in our faces. He's not going to kill them until we've got front-row seats, so we've just got to get 'em out before the show starts."

"That's the problem, though," my favorite downer in a blue chullo pointed out. "We can get Tweek and Pip. What do we do about the rest of 'em? I mean, this shit's gonna be huge - we won't be able to break EVERYBODY out."

"Dammit, Craig, we're gonna try!" I snapped, slamming the table. I swear, the old thing's got fist-marks in it, I hit it so much.

"How? How the fuck do you propose we get what could end up being HUNDREDS of people from Nevada to Colorado?"

"We don't have to get them to Colorado. If we can get everyone to scatter, Cartman won't have enough guards to chase them all."

"Yeah, but it's a desert! Say we DO bust down the walls and get everyone out - where the hell are they going to hide?"

I opened my mouth to keep arguing, but the room fell silent.

_Click-click-clack. Click-click-clack. Rap-rap-rap. _Someone was at the front door. Which is never a good sign when you're housing the biggest terrorist group on the planet in your basement.

Nobody could move - I swore some of the guys didn't even want to BREATHE. Leading the charge, I grabbed my gun and motioned the boys to come up behind me. We've practiced this a hundred times, just to make sure we cover as many bases as possible. Craig, Clyde, Mole, and I go up to check the door, Token sneaks out the back with any "undesirables" we might be hiding at the time, and the rest of the boys work on shutting things down and getting ready to move out when we give the "OKAY, CLEAR THE FUCK OUT" signal.

We haven't had to use it yet, but it's nice to know we've got the plan in place.

Mole and I hide on one side of the door, while Craig ducks under the window. (We decided a long time ago that Clyde was the best person to answer the door. He stood the best chance of stalling for time if Cartman ever DID turn up at the doorstep.) Everyone gets their guns ready, and Clyde carefully looks through the peephole.

I'm already running through the gauntlet of disasters in my head: Cartman, Butters and Kenny, an army of nazis, an assassin, Satan, Jesus, aliens, zombies...It's a nervous habit, I know, but every time there's a knock at the door, that's one more chance to get caught.

I'm so caught up in my own thought-cycle that I don't notice Clyde's panic until he's backing everyone else away from the door, hiding down by Craig below the window. "I...think it's for you, Marsh."

I give him a look, and he just nods towards the door. Keeping my pistol as close as I can while keeping it out of sight, I crack the door as slowly as I can.

The stranger at the door is tall and lanky, looking like he hasn't had a good meal in ages. He's leaning against the doorframe, like he can barely stand on his own. His clothes are a wreck, and he's covered in dirt. I can see a few red curls stick out from under his black bandana. There's an extra strip of fabric around one of his arms, like he's got a wrapped-up wound.

But after the first look-over, I notice his tired green eyes when he looks up and shoots me a smile, a dry laugh at an old inside joke. "So I got in a fight with Cartman; mind if I bunk in your room?"

* * *

><p><em>Dun-dun-dun! And so, the plot thickens. What will happen next? Who else has been warped in this horrible future? What'll happen to our favorite quartet? Find out next time! Thanks for reading, guys! :)<br>_

_____**§ Tucker's Mayflower, signing off! §**_____


	4. Wiedersehen

_Howdy, South Park! Mayflower here, prying away from the new season just long enough to bring you guys a new chapter! So let's cut all the bull and get right into it!_

**LAWYERBOT SAYS: "...Yeah, we're still doing this."**  
>South Park, both the show and its inhabitants, (c) Comedy Central<br>Comedy Central (c) Trey Parker and Matt Stone

All characters and events in this fanfiction, even those based on real people, are entirely fictional.  
>The following story contains coarse language, and due to its content, should not be read by anybody.<p>

* * *

><p><strong>CHAPTER FOUR: Wiedersehen<strong>

_Seeing You Again_

"So how did you survive?"

"How did you escape?"

"Where'd he take you?"

"Where have you been?"

"How did you find us?"

"Have you seen anyone else?"

"Man, you're a mess! What did he do to you?"

"Hey, assholes, let the kid eat and take a breather, would ya? For fuck's sake!"

Kyle just laughed, taking the big plate of leftovers I just handed him. "Stan, it's fine, relax."

"No, it's not fine." I hopped over the couch, landing in the spot right next to him. "I've got, like, a whole year of super-best friendship to catch up on, so I'm starting now."

No sooner had Kyle put the first bite in his mouth did the chatter start again. "Come on, Kyle, we've gotta know the story, man!" Clyde whined.

"Yeah, man, I saw Cartman's goons show up and grab you right before I bolted!" Token added. "I thought you were a goner! How'd you manage?"

"Jesus Christ, guys, I JUST told you to chill the fuck out!" I snapped.

"Ooh, look out, guys, you're pickin' on Marsh's boyfriend," Craig snickered.

Yeah, I'm aware the beer bottle almost took his face off. Come on, I threw it for a reason. (Typical Craig was more concerned that I wasted a perfectly-good beer.) "I'm just lookin' out for him, alright? Back off."

Kyle just laughed. I have no idea how he's smiling through this whole mess. Maybe he's just glad to be back with friends. I know I'm glad to have him home. "Stan, what's your problem? Relax, it's fine. I'm not on my death-bed or anything, I just said I was hungry."

I pinched my nose with a sigh. Jesus, I really have gotten uptight, haven't I? See, I wasn't kidding - this job's making me old. "Sorry, it's just a lot of stress and I'm tired and..." I did my best to give him a smile. I have no idea how convincing it was, but I tried. "It's just...good to have you back, man. I missed you. We all did."

"Nice to hear. Now, if I can talk with food in my mouth and you guys ask one at a time, I can tell the story. But you guys have to catch me up on what happened here afterwards. Deal?"

"Deal and me first," Token jumped in. "If you weren't gunned down like I thought, where'd they take you?"

Kyle's response was a bit muffled by the mouthful of mashed potatoes, but we all knew what he was trying to say: Arbeitsdorf. We were familiar enough with Cartman's camps in Germany, considering we hadn't been up there yet. He had two sets - work-camps and death-camps. Arbeitsdorf was the biggest of the work-camps, since it was next to the factory that produced a good chunk of his weapons. From the reports we heard, it was also one of the more unlivable - despite its size, they got the same shipment of supplies as the smaller camps, and usually had to make cuts with food, water, and blankets to make ends meet.

Craig put a few pieces together. "Well, no wonder you look like hell, Brovflovski. Did you get caught up in that salmonella outbreak that happened last week or whenever?"

Kyle just burst out laughing. "Of course I did. How else do you think Ike and I snuck out?"

"The salmonella outbreak was you?"

"Yep. I worked the kitchen and slipped spoiled meat into the stew. All of the night-guards had to stay in the barracks to deal with all of the sick kids, so Ike and I just walked out."

"Kyle, you brilliant bastard!" Mole laughed, nearly dropping his cigarette.

Gregory and I weren't laughing with everyone else, and he got to the question before I could: "If I recall, Kyle, Ike is your little brother, is he not?"

"Yeah."

"If you escaped together...where is he now?"

Kyle took a drink of water before he answered. "I sent him to Canada to find his birth parents. I thought it'd be too dangerous to bring him along."

"Kyle, you moron!" Craig gasped. "Canada's been steamrolled! You sent him straight into Cartman's hands!"

"What?!"

"Tucker, what are you smoking?" Clyde asked. "Canada's fine - Cartman can't touch that country with a ten-foot pole."

Craig scowled, handing his best friend a finger. "I was trying to mess with Brovflovski, way to play along."

Kyle, who almost went into a panic-seizure, fell into the back of the couch with a sigh. "Still dickish as ever, huh, Craig?"

"I try."

Finally, it was my turn. "So why'd you come back to South Park? Felt like visiting for old times' sake?"

Kyle took a few more bites of food before answering, like he was trying to figure that out for himself first. "Cartman needs to be stopped. This has gone too far for too long. I didn't know where to go, but I figured South Park was my best bet to find SOMETHING."

"Well, you came to the right place, Brovflovski," Token said with a nod. "We're kind of the best of the best when it comes to fucking with Cartman."

"Except for Clyde. He sucks."

"Craig, why are you a dick?!"

"POINT IS," I interrupted as loudly as I could, "we're taking Cartman down. If you're up for it, we're glad to have you on board La Resistance."

Kyle gave some kind of cheesy salute. "Then consider me on board, captain!" Then he turned back to the plate. "Just...after lunch, okay?"

x.x.x

"So that's what we've got for Burning Man. Our big problem right now is figuring out how to break everybody out and get them to safety before Cartman's goons recapture them."

"Well, when are they being brought to Nevada?"

"Nothing's moved yet, even though we've got word of the transport vehicles heading to Houston right now. Cartman's lazy, though, so they probably won't move until the last minute."

"Well, there's your answer. Once we bust the security, send everyone back to the transport vehicles. If we can get resistance members inside to hijack them, we use them to drive out and get somewhere safe. Cartman's soldiers won't be able to catch us if they're on foot."

"FOR FUCK ZAKES, WHY DIDN' WE T'INK OF Z'AT EARLIER?" Mole snapped. "Fuck meh, I'm zurrounded by idiots."

It had been a few days since Kyle turned up at our doorstep, and we were working hard on prepping the plan for the counterstrike on Operation: Burning Man. Leave it to Kyle to be the mastermind we've been needing - he spends five minutes in the war-room, and already, he's figured out our transport issue.

He was looking a lot better, too. He got cleaned up and he's been eating again, so he looks a little less like death, and we got him into normal clothes again. We even found his old ushanka, which was great for covering up that mess of red curl we couldn't risk showing off. With Kyle back on the team, it almost felt like we were playing Coon and Friends in Cartman's basement again.

Well, it was close, but not exactly. If we were REALLY playing Coon and Friends, we would need-

_Click-click-clack. Click-click-clack. Rap-rap-rap._

"Kyle, I thought you were alone," Gregory asked after the mandatory moment of tense panic.

"I am," Kyle swallowed nervously.

Time to be the leader. "Kyle, go with Token," I instructed, grabbing my gun, nodding for the boys to head upstairs.

"No, I'm going upstairs!" Kyle frowned.

"Oh, come on, Kyle, we've practiced this!" Token whined. "My job is get everybody the fuck out, and you're ruining it!"

"Kyle, don't be stupid," I snapped. "If it's Cartman or anyone else up there, you're dead."

"And you're not? Look, he already got me once. He can't do much worse the second time. I'm coming upstairs, I'm done hiding like a bitch."

"Alright, Brovflovski, where'd you get a set of balls from?" Craig had to ask while the boys waited at the stairs.

"Concentration camp," he answered simply. "Now come on, let's go see what's up."

We ran upstairs and stuck with procedure from there. Mole and I on one side, Craig and Kyle on the other, Clyde at the door. "I can't tell who it is," Clyde answered, struggling at the peep-hole. "He's in a black cloak."

"Well, how do you guys know who's friendly and who's not?" Kyle asked. "What's your password system?"

"We don't have one." So Clyde banged on the door to get the cloaked guy's attention. "Hey, what's the password?!"

The response was muffled through the door, but you could kind of hear it. No way of pinning a name to the voice, though. "You guys don't HAVE a password, now open the damn door."

"Oh, he's good."

"Clyde, you suck at this door thing," I snapped, throwing him out of the way. I looked through the peephole myself. It was definitely a guy in a black cloak, but I could also make out a face no older than the rest of us with bright-blue eyes and greasy blonde hair. It looked familiar, but I wasn't about to make assumptions. "Identify yourself!"

He laughed - a cocky kind of laugh, like he was expecting to just stroll through the front door. "What's the matter, don't recognize me without the coat?"

"Dude, seriously, who is it?" Kyle asked.

"Kyle, back up," I instructed quietly. "Mole, once I have him inside, run out and scout around for Cartman's goons. Craig, Clyde, you guys pin him down for me, okay?" Kyle ducked behind the couch and I got nods from the rest of the boys. "Alright, on three. One...two..."

We never actually go on three. It's kind of an IMPLIED three, y'know? There were way too many fights between one-two-three and one-two-three-go, so now we just go on this invisible three. Anyway, I opened the door, just wide enough to move through. I grabbed his arm and threw him inside, and Clyde and Craig jumped him while Mole ran outside to check for Cartman and the nazi-patrol.

Once he was down, I put the gun to his head. "Alright, McCormick, what the fuck do you think you're doing back in South Park?"

The hood fell away from Kenny's face while he was trying to escape Craig and Clyde. "I remembered you still have my porno rags. The fuck are you doing, hanging out with Craig's gang?"

"I think you fuckin' know, you rat! Now what are you doing back in South Park?!"

Before he could come up with a better answer, Kyle had to be stupid and interrupt. "Kenny, is that you?"

Kenny's eyes went wide when he saw Kyle. "Kyle, the fuck are you doing here? I thought you were in Germany!"

All of that time, I thought my best friend was dead. And that fuckin' hood-rat knew the whole time. "YOU KNEW HE WAS ALIVE, YOU FUCKER?!" It didn't help how pissed off I was, but it did feel really good to put my shoe into Kenny's gut after all of the shit he's been pulling with Cartman and Butters.

Kyle ran out, getting in the way of me beating Kenny up even worse. "Stan, what are you doing? Kenny's our friend!"

"Yeah, listen to the Jew-boy," Kenny groaned, trying to get the wind back in his system.

You kind of forget how to be gentle after fighting in a resistance for so long, so I was probably a bit harsh when I shoved Kyle out of my way. "Not a chance, Kyle. Kenny's been on Cartman's good side for too damn long!" I put the gun back to his head. "Now fess up, McCormick - what are you doing here?"

"If you'd give me ten seconds to make my case, I'd-" He stopped with a groan when Clyde and Craig re-pinned his squirming around. "Okay, seriously, is this how you guys treat your guests? This is just rude."

"Quit stalling, Kenny!" I snapped, firing a warning shot. (Hey, my aim's gotten pretty good after all this time.)

Kenny recoiled. Funny, he's never been afraid of guns before. "Hey, watch where you're pointin' that, Stan!"

"I'll point it at your fuckin' head if you don't fess up! Why are you stalling? Are Cartman's goons on the way?"

"Come on, Stan, do you really think I'd tell you if Cartman were involved?" He cried out when Craig and Clyde twisted his arms backwards. "Augh, augh, okay, uncle, uncle! Cartman doesn't even know I'm here, I swear!"

"Oh, likely story! Fess up, Kenny, what's going on?"

Suddenly, the door opened. "Jus' did a zearch of ze grounds, Marsh. No sign'a Cartmon anywhere."

Kenny looked up, giving a weak smile. I haven't seen him in the parka for ages now, but it's still so weird to see his mouth. "S-See? I'm alone. Gimme the best friend benefit of the doubt?"

"Oh, come on, Stan, don't fall for it!" Craig spat. "Just shoot the bastard and let's get it over with."

"Craig, why do you always just want to shoot everything?" Clyde tsked. "We SHOULD lock his ass up and hold him hostage. Come on, Cartman'll want him back! Imagine the kind of deals we could swing!"

Both really good points, but the only thing I could focus on was Kyle's look of 'don't do something stupid that you're going to regret later'. I almost forgot how badly I need him to be my voice of reason sometimes.

"Alright, McCormick. You get one shot to tell your story. Start talkin'."

* * *

><p><em>The party's been reunited! Kind of! Who will turn up next time? Is Kenny going to die again? Will SOMEONE finally slap Craig? All of these answers and more, next time on <em>Apocalypse: Cartman! _And thanks for all of the support! :)_

_____**§ Tucker's Mayflower, signing off! §**_____


	5. Held der Welt

_Fans, Y U no remind me that I'm a fat, lazy ass? D: Alright, so I'm_ KIND OF _behind my fanfiction schedule. It's only, like, three weeks, right? :D; So I'm gonna try to catch up and stay caught up this time. No more being sick and feeling like death on Saturdays, so no more missing updates, promise. NOW LET'S GET ON WITH THE SHOW!__  
><em>

**LAWYERBOT SAYS: "Don't listen to her, she's so bad at this updating thing."**  
>South Park, both the show and its inhabitants, (c) Comedy Central<br>Comedy Central (c) Trey Parker and Matt Stone

All characters and events in this fanfiction, even those based on real people, are entirely fictional.  
>The following story contains coarse language, and due to its content, should not be read by anybody.<p>

* * *

><p><strong>CHAPTER FIVE: Held der Welt<strong>

_The World's Hero_

_Ist gut der könig sein. _Who said that first, Elvis? Lion King? Eh, screw it. Whoever said it, they're damn right. Being king of the world is AWESOME.

I love waking up in the morning and looking out at my empire. Houston is my own little piece of perfect pie. Sure, I'm still a little sour that I couldn't get enough land in Germany, what with all of my camps in the way, but who could turn down this beautiful view? Winter? Nope. Hippies? Nope. Liberals? Nope. Gun control? Nope. Football and hot cheerleaders? Yes. Rodeos? Yes. Texas home cooking? Yes. All of my loving followers? HELL yes.

I love you, Texas. So much.

But I guess I can't be picky. The whole world's mine, after all - Houston is just my favorite city. I mean, what kind of countries don't I run yet? Canada? Sweden? Madagascar? Fuck those countries, who wants them anyway?

They'll come around. They ALWAYS come around.

Eh, can't sit and admire my city of gold all day, though. I got things ta do, places ta go, people ta slaughter if they don't submit to my iron fist. First, though? Breakfast.

Once I'm dressed, it's off to the elevator, and I punch the intercom button on the way in. "MAM!"

_Bzrpt. "Yes, sweetie?"_

"I'm on mah way downstairs. Is breakfas' ready?"

_"Almost, honey-bear! It'll be done when you get downstairs! I put extra chocolate-chips in your waffles!"_

Oh, sweet double-chocolate-chip waffles. "Thanks, Mam!"

_"Anything for my little snuggle-boo!" Brzpt._

Awesome. A few checks on Cartman HQ's checklist, and waffles would be mine. It's the usual stuff; pain in the ass to take a lap through two floors of the building, but ya gotta do what ya gotta do to rule an empire.

I pick a fuzzy off of my coat as the elevator doors open. This is usually where I meet up with Butters and Kenny, but it's just some dumb bitch secretary. "Where are they?"

"Professor Stotch is on the floor below," she answered, hiding behind her little clipboard like a bitch. "Kenneth's still...well..."

Missing. Son of a bitch. "We're still looking fer him, right?" I asked, setting off down the hall.

"Yes, sir. Every troop in the tri-state area has been alerted to keep an eye out for him and escort him back to Houston as soon as possible."

"Good." Try to run away from me, po' boy? I don' think so.

I cracked my fingers a little bit. "Did we finish fixing that outbreak at Arbeitsdorf?"

"Production has continued, but it's still a bit slow. It should be back up to maximum quota in the next week."

"They have three days."

"Yes, sir, _mein Führer._"

I stop, taking a peek out the window at the training yards below. I love seeing my boys in red. Look at them, lines of soldiers, looking sharp in red coats and black hats, all wearing yellow C's on their shoulders and white swastikas on their capes. A whole army, all dedicating their lives to me and my new world order. I could almost stare at them all day.

But I can't. They have jobs to do. "Send the _reich _out to the ghettos, make sure we've flushed out all those immigrants from that underground train we caught the other day."

"Right away, sir."

I went to turn the corner, but ran straight into a pretty brunette in a red coat. "Mornin', Eric. 'Bout time your lazy ass got out of bed."

"Look, I own half the world, I c'n get up whatever time I want," I argued. "'Sides, I'm not scheduled to get nagged 'til after lunch, now what do you want, bitch?"

She laughed. It's a game we play, which is alright with me - I'll take yellin' at a bitch to get back to the kitchen over the kissy-goo-goo pet names any day. Thank God she's not queer with the pet-names like her brother. "I heard your blonde boyfriends are taking a vacation, so I decided to come play house."

I put an arm around her, following her down the hall. "Good, I'd rather have you than those fags any day, Shell."

Yeah, I didn't stutter. Shelley Marsh. I know, I wouldn't've believed it at first, either, but MAN, she was a fox when they pulled off that headgear. A fox that just happened to be into anarchy and new world order. Who knew?

As usual, though, the bitch is all business. "So we're finishing up the plans for Operation: Burning Man," she started, pulling out her phone the second I had my arm on her. "The transport trucks just arrived, so we can load up all of the prisoners tonight and ship out tomorrow morning."

"Can't it wait 'til, like, tahmarah AFTERNOON er somethin'?"

"You are the laziest dictator ever."

"I c'n afford ta be. Come on, they ain' goin' nowhere."

"Fine, tomorrow afternoon so po' widdle Ewic c'n have his ceweal and Satu'day mowning cawtoons."

"Tahmarah's not even Saturday!"

"I'm just jokin', chill your man-tits. Anyway, the strike-zone is clear, and the cage is set up. We'll have the missile labs filled up, so all you have to do is hit the button and-"

"BOOM! Good-bye, hippies." I laugh every time I say that. The Burning Man strike is my opus magnum, the ONE thing I've been looking forward to since the day I stormed Texas and started my snowball to victory. (...Okay, apart from the death-camps. And the Mexico wall. And the private army. And owning half the world. And my amusement-park chain.) I've been saying it for YEARS - just wait 'til Burning Man starts, then nuke the shit out of it. It's already a desert anyway, come on!

And we've got spies and prisoners from all over the world in on this. We even snagged Tweek and Pip in California. Oh, yeah, this is going to be the best.

"Alright, I'll go down and finish getting the _reich _briefed so widdle Ewic c'n go have his bweakfast," Shelley laughed, turning at the next corner. I gave her a good kick in the ass on the way, but not before giving her a kiss. Look, I'm not a TOTAL dirtbag to my girl, okay?

"Eric! Err-iiiiicc! ERIC, ERIC, ERIC!"

I can, however, be a dirtbag to Butters. I quite enjoy that part. Especially when he has the balls to rush up the stairs right before I head downstairs for breakfast. "You're late, Butters - this better be good."

Butters clamored up, dropping to his knees like a pussy while he tried to catch his breath. If he quit wearing that Professor Chaos costume around, he'd probably run faster. Granted, it's nice - he finally upgraded to some real metal, not that tinfoil crap he was using before, but come on, Butters, it's just not effective.

"S-S-Sorry, Eric," he panted, pulling off his helmet to mess with that little patch of blonde hair he's still got. "I-I was downstairs in the holdin' cell, 'n I was tryin' ta come up here 'n get you faster, but then Lexus showed up, and gosh, Eric, you know I can' just say no ta her, so-"

"Spit it out, Stotch!"

"Spit what? O-Oh, yeah, the news!" He grabbed my arm and dragged me down the stairs to the next floor down. "Come on, Eric, you won't believe who we got! Oh, you're gon' be so excited!"

"DAMMIT, BUTTERS, I DON'T DO STAIRS!" God, I wasn't planning on this much physical activity today.

We finally made it downstairs, despite all my screaming not getting us anywhere, and Butters dragged my ass down to the interrogation chambers. "For fuck's sake, Butters, slow the fuck down! The hell is your problem, you little spaz?!"

Butters kicked down the door, letting me walk inside. I dunno how the kid pulls off the occasional moment of bad-ass, but he gets them. "See for yourself."

So I did. There were two prisoners, both tied up to chairs with their mouths gagged. (At least my capture squad can still do their damn jobs.) One was a girl, kinda blonde and kinda scrawny, with a little bruise on her cheek that I'd seen a hundred-thousand times before. The other was a boy, probably not even in his teens yet, with a mess of black hair and beady little black eyes that screamed 'Canadian scumbag.'

Oh, this was going to be sweet. "Butters, go downstairs and tell Mam I'm gonna be a little late ta breakfast."

Butters gave a little laugh. His evil laugh sucks, seriously. It's like some fag giggle that he never grew out of, but he tries ta make it sound all tough. "Got it, Eric!"

Once he was gone, I shut the door.

"Well, well, well, if it ain' lil' Karen 'n mah old first mate Ike. A'right, you two, time ta fess up: where are yer brothers hiding?"

* * *

><p><em>Ooh, drama! Will Cartman find another way to be a huge dick and ruin everyone's day? What's going to go down at Burning Man? Why doesn't anybody like Butters? Find out the answers to all of this and more next time on <em>Apocalypse: Cartman_! Thanks for reading, guys!_

______**§ Tucker's Mayflower, signing off! §**______


	6. Die Älteren Götter

_Yay! Oh, man, do I love being back on schedule. XD And I'm sure you guys are glad to hear it, too, so everybody's happy, right? We can put that whole "three-week hiatus" behind us, right? :D; _

_Alright, alright, take your chapter, I'll go back to the corner.  
><em>

**LAWYERBOT SAYS: "Don't worry, she's been spending a lot of time in that corner."  
><strong>South Park, both the show and its inhabitants, (c) Comedy Central  
>Comedy Central (c) Trey Parker and Matt Stone<p>

All characters and events in this fanfiction, even those based on real people, are entirely fictional.  
>The following story contains coarse language, and due to its content, should not be read by anybody.<p>

* * *

><p><strong>CHAPTER SIX: Die Älteren Götter<strong>

_The Elder Gods_

So here we are, three for four back together in South Park. I still don't know how I managed to not get my head blown off. They were NOT happy to see me. (Guess I should've seen that coming, though.)

Stan calmed down a little bit once he was convinced I came alone, but I think it was Kyle that really pulled through for me. Daywalker saves the day again, thank God. I had to swear away all of my allegiances to Cartman, like, six times over, but I think they finally bought it. They've let me in on their big plans to crash Burning Man (which I TOTALLY forgot about), but at the cost that I can't wander off on my own too far. Eh, fair's fair, I guess.

I can still sit on the back porch, so that's what I'm doing, enjoying the night sky and a cigarette. I've been on edge ever since I left Texas, and I think it's obvious. Am I seriously about to go through with this? Backstabbing the most powerful man on Earth and crashing his hippie-nuke? This is the kind of stupid stuff I would do when we were ten. Y'know, back when death wasn't a big deal.

I used to shrug it off. Hell, I used to THREATEN people to point their guns at me. Better a bullet go through my skull than touch Karen or Stan or Kyle, y'know? It's so different now, knowing that the next bullet to my head is going to be my last. I can feel the handgun in my pocket, but I haven't turned the safety off of it in years. It used to be my shortcut home. It used to be my best friend. Having a really shitty day? Bang. Want to just skip school and get home? Bang. Don't feel like walking through the ghetto? Bang.

From shooting myself every day to forgetting how to fire it.

"Oh, how the mighty have fallen."

Trying not to spit out my cigarette, I looked up at the not-so-mysterious stranger. He hadn't changed much in all of these years (though I'm guessing SOMETHING happened to land him with La Resistance). He still had greasy black hair and scraggly eyebrows, and still scowled at everyone who got too close, willing them to burn with his mind.

"Long time, no see, Thorn."

"Enough with the formalities, immortal," Damien spat. Friendly as ever, I see. "What are you doing here?"

"Cigarette." There's something about pissing Damien off that just makes my day. Maybe I'm still mad about the platypus thing from third grade, who knows.

"Not what I meant. What are you doing here with La Resistance?"

"Vigilantism. My little sister got to me, and...I dunno, I can't just sit by and let Cartman steamroll everyone, y'know?"

Damien scoffed. "I'll never understand why you waste your powers to do good."

"And I'll never understand how you're such a dick, even though your dad's such a nice guy."

I paused. I almost told him. Damien and I have this weird sort of brothership at times (even after the platypus thing). We don't spend a whole lot of time together - when we do, it's usually while I'm limboing in Hell between reincarnations - but he's not a terrible guy. He's the little brother you can't help but pick on, y'know?

And in that second, he could tell something was up. He knows me better than that. "Something's bothering you."

"No."

"You're anxious. I can tell by the way you're sitting."

"Am not."

"BANG!"

I jumped. New nervous habit. "Jesus Christ, Damien, the hell was that for?!"

He just laughed. (I really have become a pussy, haven't I?) "The high and mighty Mysterion, son of the Elder Gods, scared of loud noises? You used to shoot yourself for fun, and now you're afraid of gunshots?"

"Look, it's complicated, okay? Cartman pulled some shit, and now I don't know what's wrong with my powers."

Damien tsked, getting up to head back inside. "Really, Kenneth, your stupid is incredible. If you want your powers back so badly, why not just do what your parents did before you were born and ask for them?"

...

Huh. Not such a bad idea.

x.x.x

_Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn_

Ugh. I hate this dusty old Necronomicon. Gives me the spooks every time I pull it out, y'know? Cartman was sure nice to find me a copy, right? "Oh, Kinny, I know it must suck to not have superpowers anymore, but I gotcha a present so you c'n remember it!"

Bastard.

Alright, Kenny, focus. Remember what's at stake here. Just keep mumbling that mantra. I think that's how you summon him, right? It's got Cthulhu in it, right? Something bout R'lyeh? Hastur hastur hastur?

_AGTHA STELL'BSNA?_

Oh, Jesus, where did that come from? I look around every angle, but there's nothing. It's just Kyle's backyard, everybody else is inside and asleep.

Then I look down at the book. The letters are shimmering in this spooky greenish-blue. Normal day in South Park, right?

I don't speak three words of Cthulhu's R'lyeh mumbo-jumbo, so I just went with it. "U-Uh...hey, 'Thulu, what's up? Long time, no see, old pal."

_ULNUH'E DASHOGG?_

I'm guessing that means 'cut to the chase.' "Y-Yeah, sorry to wake you up or whatever, but...I-I don't know what my drunk-ass parents did to give me my immortality powers, but they're gone. I want them back. What's it take to hook a brother up?"

I looked down at the book, like the English subtitles were going to show up on there, and in the blink of an eye, a slimy green tentacle shot out and grabbed my face. I couldn't breathe - all I felt was water, and it felt like I was drowning. Everything went dark, and I could feel tentacles grabbing at my arms and legs, trying to drag me down further into this spooky black abyss.

_That is not dead which can eternal lie_

_And with strange aeons, even death may die_

...

And it was over. I was back in Kyle's backyard, and the book was closed and back to not-glowing. It was like that never even happened.

That is not dead which can eternal lie, and with strange aeons, even death may die. That phrase has haunted me since the Coon days when we were kids. To this day, I'm not sure what it means. I've always just kind of interpreted it to mean that only an immortal can kill an immortal, but what does that have to do with me now?

...Unless...

_Bang, bang, bang, bang! _Before I could do anything about my new realization, a line of gunfire knocked me back to reality and its real-world problems. Those shots were way too close for comfort.

_There was a firefight at La Resistance._

"Hang on, guys, I'm coming!" I grabbed my book and stowed it, then rushed back to the house as fast as I could.

But it was too late.

By the time I got back, everyone was gone.

* * *

><p><em>Oh, no! What happened to La Resistance? What will Kenny do now? Will the new world order prevail, or does love conquer all? Find out the answers to all this and more, next time on <em>Apocalypse: Cartman! _Thanks for reading, guys!_

_**_§ Tucker's Mayflower, signing off! §_**_


	7. Gefangen

_Hello, South Park! Blah-blah, welcome back, blah-blah, new chapter, excited-blah, everybody dances, LET'S GET ON WITH THE SHOW!_

**LAWYERBOT SAYS: Something witty.  
><strong>South Park, both the show and its inhabitants, (c) Comedy Central  
>Comedy Central (c) Trey Parker and Matt Stone<p>

All characters and events in this fanfiction, even those based on real people, are entirely fictional.  
>The following story contains coarse language, and due to its content, should not be read by anybody.<p>

* * *

><p><strong>CHAPTER SEVEN: Gefangen<strong>

_Captured_

"Seriously, how the hell did they find us?"

"Oh, like it isn't obvious? Kenny called in the dogs! Once a traitor, always a traitor!"

"Oh, come on, you don't know that! You can't pin the blame like that!"

"Then where was Kenny? Why isn't Mr. Mysterion hog-tied in the back of this damn truck with us?"

"Well..."

"EXACTLY."

Normally, it's my job to shut Craig up when he's being a dick. This time, though, I had to let him go. I mean, he was right - all signs pointed to Kenny. The second he "went outside for a cigarette", Cartman's goons (and their barrel of tear gas) were right on top of us. Who else could've given Cartman the tip-off?

Ugh. I've been sitting in the corner, feeling like an idiot the entire ride from Colorado to Nevada. Kyle didn't know better, but I did. How could I have been so stupid?

Fuck you, Kenny. Wherever you are, fuck you.

We got caught in the night, so we made it to the Black Rock Desert by morning. Just in time for Burning Man. Yay. When the transport vehicle pulled to a stop, I gave a nod to the boys, right before the guards came and dragged us out. Our plan still had to go down, as much of it as we planned, anyway. We were on the inside now, which complicated things, but we've made it out of complicated situations before.

The strike-zone was huge - a giant, rickety cage in the center of the empty desert, surrounded by transport vehicles that were all escorting prisoners inside. The top of the cage fizzled with electricity, and armed guards in bulletproof armor stood at each door. As soon as we got inside, you could hear the pangs of metal below our feet; they installed a floor to keep anyone from tunneling out.

Cartman was a lot of things. Overly paranoid became one of them when he took over.

I was busy scoping the walls, trying to find our best escape route, when a familiar "Nyee-AH!" snapped my concentration. "G-G-G-GUYS?! O-Oh, my God, w-what are you guys doing here?! H-How'd you get caught? What happened? D-Did they storm the base?! Oh, my God, we're doomed, aren't we? P-PLEASE say we're not doomed!"

"Wow, someone wasn't getting their coffee in Cartman's cells," Craig joked flatly, earning a solid punch from Gregory.

"Tweek, calm down," I said, ruffling his mess of blonde hair in hopes of quieting him down. Man, he looked a wreck. Cartman does NOT take care of his resistance prisoners. "Don't worry about it, we're getting out of here."

"Well, I do hope that getting captured was part of your plan, Stanley," Pip interjected, sneaking into the group. "This box looks shoddy, but it's bound up quite right. Not sure how we're supposed to get out of this one."

"Oh, come on, Pip, you're the glass-half-full guy!" Clyde whined. "If you say we can't do it, we're doomed!"

"Everyone shut up and focus!" Finally, I had all eyes on me. (Well, I did after Tweek saw Kyle and nearly passed out from panic. "Smuggling a J-Jew?! AUGH! Jesus CHRIST, no wonder you guys got c-caught!") "Everyone start looking around. Try to find ANYTHING that looks like a weak spot. First chance we can, we'll gun for all of the options at once. The rest of the crowd should jump in, and Cartman doesn't have enough goons to watch everything at once."

At least, I was HOPING that last part was true. I only saw four or five of them; the rest were back at the transports, waiting to rush out when Cartman gave the launch orders. On the flip side, there were at least a hundred of us inside, if not more, and I was willing to bet most of them were other resistance members.

No sooner did I dismiss the boys, though, did the big screen at the head of the cage flicker on. It was a projection, blowing up the small stage at the front, hiding behind bulletproof glass. I should've known - we've busted more than enough of these events to know Cartman's schedule. He ALWAYS has to gloat.

Once the cameras warmed up, his fat head took up the screen. "Good morning, _mein schwein! _I hope you're all excited to be testing my new nuclear missiles program! You guys are an important phase of my long reign as the world's greatest conquerer, y'know - if these missles flatten your corpses the way I want them too, Canada'll be all mine. Won't that be jus' swell?"

"LA RESISTANCE LIVES ON!" one of the crowd-goers screamed, starting a sea of boos and hisses. We started that tradition by screaming it right before we raided our first prison-wipe a few months ago. Now everyone does it; if nothing else, it's a kick in the balls to Cartman's ego when he's interrupted.

This time, though, he just laughed. "No, actually, dumb-ass, it doesn't. See, we've got some very special guests in the audience today!" He closed in on the camera. "Hi, Kahl! Nice'a you ta come all the way from Auschwitz ta join us today! And Kinny - sweet, po', innocent, po' bastard Kinny. Did you REALLY think you could git away with tryin' ta run from ME?"

He stepped back, the camera following as he moved to the side. "See, La Resistance is among you tonight - Marsh, Donovan, Black, Tucker, the British kids, the whole bunch. All because of my two new best friends!"

Two more prisoners entered the frame, both tied up with ropes around their mouths. One, a teenage girl with a mess of sandy-brown hair and a mark on one of her cheeks. The other, a frail looking pre-teen boy with long black hair and beady black eyes. It had been too long since I'd seen either of them, but Cartman's context clues (and Kyle's massive freak-out nearby) gave me all of the hints I needed.

Karen McCormick and Ike Brovflovski.

Cartman kicked both of them off of the stage, and the other resistance members rushed to the stage door to help them up. "Yeah, why don' you two git in there 'n join yer brothers, hmm? One last family reunion 'fore you all get splatted into radioactive desert dust. It's the least I can do, since you two were SO nice to tell me where they were hiding!"

He paused for a second, eyes away and tapping his chin. "Hmm...I don't think I've forgotten anything...Oh, well, if I do, I'll just finish later." He gave us a straight-armed salute. "Well, hippies 'n resistances 'n liberals 'n whoever else is out there, it's been fun! You gave it a good try, just wasn't good enough. I'm gonna hit the button once I'm out of the state, so you'll have a good two or three hours ta sit 'n get toasty with each other 'fore you all die. Sound like fun?"

He turned to exit the camera frame.

_BOOM! _A flurry of black shot onto the screen, knocking Cartman aside. Guards went into a panic as alarms started to siren, all of the shoddy doors sliding open as the electric fences shut down.

The figure stood up. Black cloak with a violet suit, topped off with lime-green question marks. "GO, GO, GO!" he commanded in his usual gruff voice. "The power's down, now's your chance!" Like a resistance needs to be told to run for open doors.

A huge chaos broke out, so I stood back and helped everyone else push through the stampede and make it to the doors. That gave me the chance to sit back and watch the disaster that everyone else missed.

Cartman started swearing in German off-screen, and I saw Butters and Shelley jump in and try to wrestle Mysterion down. Despite his best attempts to fight them off (in that Butters got a bloody nose, but my sister's not a total fag like he is), they managed to force him to his knees, each whipping out their pistols.

_BANG! BANG!_

Two bullets, one from each gun. Both straight into the back of Kenny's head.

* * *

><p><em>Oh, no, suspense and intrigue! D: Can our boys escape the Black Rock Desert? Will Cartman live to be a dick another day? Find out the answers to all this and more on the next installment of <em>Apocalypse: Cartman! _Thanks for reading, guys!_

_**_§ Tucker's Mayflower, signing off! §_**_


	8. Ende

_Hello, South Park! Who's ready to finish this bad boy off with a bang, huh? That's right, welcome to the penultimate chapter of Apocalypse: Cartman! Are we all ready to get to the big, explosive ending? :D_

_...Alright, alright, I'll quit blabbing. ON WITH THE SHOW!  
><em>

**LAWYERBOT SAYS: "Dear God, is it over yet?"  
><strong>South Park, both the show and its inhabitants, (c) Comedy Central  
>Comedy Central (c) Trey Parker and Matt Stone<p>

All characters and events in this fanfiction, even those based on real people, are entirely fictional.  
>The following story contains coarse language, and due to its content, should not be read by anybody.<p>

* * *

><p><strong>CHAPTER EIGHT: Ende<strong>

_End_

All of the resistance groups met up amongst themselves once everyone was out of the cage, and many of them grabbed transport vehicles and high-tailed it. All according to plan, even though most of them weren't there.

La Resistance, on the other hand, had just gathered the troops, and were now collecting their bearings after that chaotic attack. (Despite their reputation as one of the most destructive resistance movements around, the group actually ran on a certain amount of dumb luck and utter chaos. 'Tis the life of a South Parkian.)

"See, I TOLD you Kenny didn't rat us out!" Kyle defended, both arms tight around his little brother, who was covered in plenty of welts and bruises that the boys could easily identify as Cartman torture chamber tactics.

"No, it was your fuckin' little brother!" Craig snapped. He pointed a finger at Karen. "And Kenny's little whore sister!"

"I'm sorry, I didn't know!" Karen cried, tears in her pretty blue eyes. "Kenny never mentioned you guys! They told me to guess where he went, so I said South Park!"

"For fuck's zake, everybody shut up!" Mole snapped, grinding his cigarette into the dirt with his foot. "Le's just get one of ze transports, go the fuck home, 'n then you all c'n be bi'ches aboot who fucked who, alright?!"

The boys came to a tense agreement, and all began to move towards one of the remaining transports.

All except for Stan.

"Stan, you comin'?" Kyle asked.

Stan didn't move. The image of Kenny's gruesome death still burned into his mind, Stan's dark blue eyes were fixed on Cartman's escape vehicle, which was parked away from the other transports. Loaded with him, Butters, Shelley, and two guards, it was grinding through the desert sand towards the western horizon.

Nowhere NEAR Cartman's home base of Houston, Texas.

"He's up to something," the Marsh boy finally said, running off towards an alternate vehicle. "You guys head back to South Park. Grab anything that's left from the old base and start piling it into my old house. There's a spare key in the false bottom of the mailbox, check EVERYTHING for bugs before you do anything."

"STAN!"

The noirette froze, turning to face his redheaded super-best. "What? I'm going to lose him, I can't wait up!"

"Exactly, so come on!" Kyle said, shoving Stan towards the alternate vehicle. "You just have to bring me with you!"

"God-dammit, Kyle!"

"Look, do we have time to argue about this?!"

"No!"

"Then let's go!"

Stan gave a groan, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Fine, hurry up!"

"Count me in!" Clyde jumped in, running after.

"Me, too!" Token followed.

Mole gave a sharp sigh. "Or we could go fuck things up. I like z'is plan, too."

"You morons are going to get us killed, you know that?" Craig pointed out, he, Gregory, and Damien the last to hop into the back of the transport.

Pip waved down the car before they rushed off. "Tweek and I will take Ike and Karen back to South Park. If we don't hear from you by tomorrow?"

"Assume the worst," Stan answered. "Don't come looking."

x.x.x

Following Cartman as closely as they could without risking notice, the boys (along with two or three other transports that overheard their plans and decided to follow) tracked the dictator all the way into the depths of Las Vegas, where the transport unloaded into an old, but heavily guarded warehouse.

"Turns out those rumors about Cartman's hidey-houses were right," Stan noted dryly. In all of their other raid attempts, Cartman had the ability to disappear into any city at any time. Rumors were spreading that he had property in every state and used it to hide when things went sour. Rumor just became fact, and fact became advantage.

The attack transports pulled over a few blocks down, and the groups pulled together and armed themselves as well as they could. They were all missing weapons, but said weapons were stowed in the front seats of the transport vehicles for the guards.

"Sorry, guys, we're a few short," Clyde called, pulling himself from the hidden storage, only discovering six guns for their party of eight.

"Damien doesn't need one," Stan was quick to point out. Everyone on the team was more than familiar with Damien's powers of darkness. "Kyle, you just stay close to me, okay? I'll cover you." It seemed the most reasonable - Kyle was the least-experienced with firearms.

At least, until Stan felt a metal tap on his shoulder. "Or he could borrow one of mine. I've got two."

Everyone was in some form of shock when they turned to face their newest partner. Craig, ever the team wit, spoke first: "Come on, McCormick, we're adults - lose the costume."

Kenny pulled the cloak over his suit self-consciously. "What, I think it's kinda cool."

Ignoring the jokes, Stan was in shock, trying to wipe the hallucination from his eyes. "Kenny?!"

The blonde put his hands up in a mock surrender. "Hey, look, Stan, before you say ANYTHING, I did NOT rat you out, okay?"

"No, I got that part. Dude, I saw you get shot! How are you still alive?!"

Kenny sighed. "That is not dead which can eternal lie, and with strange aeons, even death may die." He cracked a trademark McCormick pervy smile. "Sorry, Marsh - your sister's built like a goddess, but she's no immortal."

"Yeah, no shit," Stan spat, always cringing upon mention that he and Shelley Cartman shared a bloodline. "So you're not dead, and we may as well not ask why. Are you with us, then?"

Kenny handed the spare gun in question to Kyle, right before loading his own. "I followed you everywhere when we were kids, didn't I? I'll sure as hell do it again."

x.x.x

"God-DAMMIT! I thought we had them! Where did we fuck up?! SOMEBODY TELL ME WHERE THE FUCK WE FUCKED UP! Heads are gonna fly for this, HEADS ARE FUCKIN' GONNA FLY!"

Cartman flipped a table with a panicked growl, head spinning in frantic anger. Everything was set! This was to be his shining achievement, and what did he have to show for all of the work? A destroyed cage in the middle of the Black Rock desert.

"W-Well, ya can' win 'em all, Eric," Butters interjected, trying to calm his pacing superior. "We'll jus' hang low fer a day er two, then head back ta Houston, 'n everythin's gon' work out jus' fine!"

Cartman sighed sharply. The Vegas warehouse was his last resort; a dictator's political fallout shelter. It was one of the best-protected places in America, but at the cost of entrapment. He was a sitting duck, and no one knew that better than him. "The less time we spend here, the better, Butters. I dunno who was involved in that mess, but shit's gone down in the worst way. The second the coast is clear, I wanna get the fuck outta here 'n do some crowd control. The longer we stay here, the more time we're givin' to-"

_KA-BOOSH! _The plated walls shook as an explosion rocked the entrance, the _clank_s of metal footsteps slowly flooding their way into the base. "OH, GOD-FUCKING-DAMMIT!"

"Oh, Jesus, how'd they find us?!" Butters jumped as their few remaining guards rushed to defend the warehouse.

"Someone outside gave them directions," Shelley spat sarcastically. "They must've followed our transport! How else could they have found us?!"

"Who the fuck cares how they found us?!" Cartman shrieked, grabbing his gun and rushing for the back of their room. Like most of his bases across the map, Cartman made sure there was always more than one way out. In this particular case, it was a secret exit hidden behind an old bookcase. The second door led into a tunnel, which led to a sidewalk grate outside of the fencing of the compound.

As soon as he hit the button, though, he found something else behind the second door: a Marsh, a Brovflovski, and a McCormick. "Surprise, fat-ass."

x.x.x

Cartman backed up (in the manliest of fashions, of course), allowing Shelley and Butters to move in beside him as the boys entered the super-secret hiding place.

The stage was set. Nobody had to speak; everyone had claimed their target. There was a moment of calm, as if everyone was waiting for the bell, and when the imaginary gun fired, everyone jumped into the fray.

Kenny tried to dive for Cartman, but Mysterion was stopped by his original arch-nemesis, the wily Professor Chaos. "Ken, the hell are you doin'?!" Butters snapped. "Yer on OUR side, remember?!"

"Not anymore, Butters!" Kenny growled, struggling to escape Butters' squirmy attempts at playing 'keepaway'. "I'm through with being Cartman's bitch! It's time I owned up to the stupid shit I've done!"

Kenny gave Butters a swift kick in the gut, only to recoil with a yell when the stuttering blonde shoved a taser into his leg. Mysterion had grown and trained over the years, but so had Professor Chaos, who was now outfitted with a small arsenal of weapons more befitting of an evil, socially-rejected mad scientist.

While Kenny was stunned by the shock, Butters tackled him down, doing his best to pin the caped crusader. "W-Well, sorry 'bout this, Ken, but I ain't gon' let you mess all this up fer me! I quit bein' a pussy who gets pushed around way too long ago ta let some hood-rat try ta mess with me!"

Butters realized that he was at a disadvantage. Professor Chaos' power was ingenuity and human disdain, but that didn't exactly match up with Mysterion's immortality. Especially since Cartman promised that power was gone, and it obviously wasn't. (Looking back, though, both blondes should've known from the start that Cartman was doing what Cartman does best: blow smoke and hope nobody thinks about it too hard.) Still, so many years at the top had only taught the stumbling Stotch one surefire self-defense technique:

Shoot it in the head and hope for the best. So that's what he did. _BANG!_

Kenny gave an involuntary cry as brain matter and blood began to spill onto the floor. Convinced he was down for the count (at least for a little bit), Butters hopped to his feet before the debris could stain his uniform, then ran to assist Cartman in the fight.

_THUNK! _Three steps later, Butters found himself being dragged to the ground by something latched onto his ankle. Looking back in a panic, he found that "something" to be Kenny, who had one hand firmly latched in place while the other pulled out a gun. The Professor of chaos panickedly begged for mercy when Mysterion rose from yet another grave, watching with horrified eyes as the bloody hole in the back of his head began to mend, the blood covering his face beginning to wash itself away.

There was a devilish glow in Kenny's normally-clear blue eyes, and Butters shivered as he heard chants of a nonsensical language in the slowly-oncoming darkness. "Well, it's a good thing this child of the Elder Gods isn't 'just some hood rat'."

x.x.x

Shelley tried to dive for Cartman, but was tackled down by her now-not-so-little brother. Stan's impressive football build appeared just in time to try out for junior varsity, and the elder Marsh still frowned upon memories of the day when her favorite punching bag suddenly surpassed her in height and bulk.

However, where Stan was built for football and baseball, Shelley was built for gymnastics and swimming. The Marsh kids both dominated in athleticism and physical prowess, but in different ways. And as the two came to blows, it was obvious where their strengths lied. Stan was the brute force, throwing heavy kicks and punches, anything to cause as much collateral damage to his traitorous sister as possible. Shelley was the hidden muscle, weaving in and out of her brother's furious attacks, waiting for the opportunity to strike quickly and efficiently.

They dared not exchange words, only the occasional yelp of pain and assorted grunts of exertion as they exchanged blows instead. Shelley and Stanley Marsh hadn't spoken in two years, ever since Shelley left for college in Washington, D.C. and decided to start seeing a young and ambitious Eric Cartman, who wooed her with dreams of a new world order to fix all of the madness and bullshit of everyday life. Shelley had found the love of her life, who had stripped Stan of his.

As far as Stan was concerned, he was an only child. The two had never gotten along, so it wasn't exactly heartbreaking to disown such a poor excuse for a sister. Which brought them to this day, this moment, this fist-fight: brother against sister, one bloodline fighting for two world orders.

They hadn't spoken in over two years. And as Stan pulled the trigger and sent the bullet flying into his sister's head, he planned on keeping it that way.

x.x.x

With guns and fists flying every which way, Kyle and Cartman found it extremely difficult to focus on their own fight. Neither one was properly suited for combat; the redhaired diabetic and overweight whiner were typically picked last for good reason (unless they were playing basketball, but a perfect free-throw record wasn't going to help the young Jew here). Kyle had spent the revolution wasting away in Germany, while Cartman spent it riding his private roller coasters and playing the armies of the world like he were playing an intricate game of _Civilization XV_.

Kyle did his best to maintain a tough face, keeping his shaking gun pointed at Cartman at all times. "We've got you now, Cartman."

Eric, realizing the opportunity he had in this one-on-one against Kyle, disregarded the weapon while carefully clutching his own. "Y'know, Kahl, don' you think you owe me one? Come on, Jew, we're friends, aren't we?"

"No! The fuck makes you think we're still friends after the shit you've pulled?!"

"You DO know I killed Timmy and Jimmy that day, right? Would've gotten Token too, if the squirmy black bastard didn't sneak through the cracks in the wall. Point is, Kahl, yer the legendary Jersey Ginger Jew. I should'a killed you three times that day. An' I didn't. Why? 'Cause I'm a nice guy!"

"You did it so that you could torture me and my little brother in a concentration camp!"

"Eh, tomaytah, tomahtah. Kahl, Kahl, Kahl, point is, you're an unkillable ginger, and I'm the most powerful man on earth. Why don't you just put down the gun, and I'll put down mah gun, and we'll both just walk away from this, huh? You grab Ike and scurry off to Canada, and I won't even touch it."

Common sense demanded Kyle to consider the deal, so Cartman took a few uncomfortable steps forward, gently tracing Kyle's scarred arm with the tip of his gun. "Look, Jew, jus' take yer battle-scar and go home. Don' you miss yer brother? Don't you miss, I dunno, readin' and takin' care of yer Facebook farm? Huntin' for Jew gold and whatever you did for fun?"

Kyle lowered his gun for a second, and in that moment, Cartman thought he had won; that his golden tongue had saved the day once more, and while he would be down Butters and Shelley, at least he would escape to dictate another day.

"Not a chance, you bastard!" This proved not to be the case when Kyle smashed into Cartman's hefty arm. The redhead scrambled to hold onto his weapon, but Cartman recoiled with a cry of pain (and several curses, both English and German), stepping back and giving Kyle room to breathe. And by the time Cartman looked up again, his partners in crime were gone, leaving Stan and Kenny free to rejoin Kyle against him.

Finally, the moment was upon them. Stan, Kyle, Kenny, and Cartman. The South Park quartet, the original bus-stop gang, all reunited at last.

How times had changed.

Stan gave a smirk, vindication and adrenaline rushing through his veins. He was a peace activist, of course, but always said he'd have no problem putting a bullet through Cartman's skull. Now that there were three guns to his head, it seemed oh, so easy. "Game over, fat-ass. You lose."

Now Cartman was a cunning bastard; they all knew it, despite being immune to his tricks. He was a master of deceiving the dumb, a self-named king of articulation and politics. Cartman knew every trick in the book for worming out of trouble, from the LeBron James to the Johnny Cochran, to his favorite tactic of laying down and crying until you were close enough to sock in the nose.

This time, though, there were no tricks. Cartman was smart - smarter than most realized when you took his size and accent into account. And smart men know when they've lost the game.

So Cartman gave a laugh, clapping slowly. "Bravo, my boys - it seems in our childhood, I've trained you well. I guess TOO well."

"You didn't train us for shit, Cartman!" Kyle scowled, needing to be held back by a reasonably-suspicious Kenny.

"Oh, I think I have, Kahl. Come on, we've been playing since the four of us could walk. You all know my game better than any of the idiots on this entire planet. If it weren't you three, nobody could figure out my ruse."

"Yeah, well now we've got you, Cartman," Stan re-emphasized, gripping his gun tightly. "So any last words?"

Cartman looked down at his own weapon. Outnumbered three-to-one, he couldn't even point it properly. There was no way out. He was trapped.

But Eric Cartman only lost on his own terms. So instead of pointing the gun at his old friends, he turned it to his own temple.

"Good game, guys."

_BANG!_

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><p><em>Not gonna say much here; turn the page for the epilogue! :D<br>_

__**_§ Tucker's Mayflower, signing off! §_**__


	9. Endlich

_Hello, South Park! Man, was that ending a rush or what? Well, I didn't see the point of keeping you guys hanging for an epilogue, so here it is, hot off the presses! Enjoy! :)  
><em>

**LAWYERBOT SAYS: "Oh, thank God, it's over."  
><strong>South Park, both the show and its inhabitants, (c) Comedy Central  
>Comedy Central (c) Trey Parker and Matt Stone<p>

All characters and events in this fanfiction, even those based on real people, are entirely fictional.  
>The following story contains coarse language, and due to its content, should not be read by anybody.<p>

* * *

><p><strong>CHAPTER NINE: Endlich<strong>

_At Last_

For days, nobody could believe it, no matter how many times it appeared on the news. It was over.

Despite all of the press hailing them as the new-world heroes and shattered governments begging for their assistance in reassembling the world, the boys of La Resistance returned to South Park. They were always taught to keep their own houses clean first, and that's where rebuilding began - the restoration of their quiet, mountain town.

At least, MOST of them returned to South Park. Kyle and Ike returned to Germany, personally shutting down factories and freeing prisoners from the death camps. They would return to South Park later, once all of the broken families were as fixed as possible. Kyle and Ike became a beacon of hope for the scattered minorities, particularly the Jews, who were inspired to come together and rebuild the families and communities that Cartman destroyed. Together, the old buildings of Auschwitz actually became a temporary shelter and synagogue for the displaced Jewish prisoners.

Karen returned to South Park. Kenny did not. The youngest of the McCormick children appeared at La Resistance headquarters (which now focused on rebuilding the town instead of destroying Cartman's empire), carrying a cryptic note detailing that she is now to be treated as a Marsh. "Just until I get back. I've got some unfinished business to take care of." It was signed with a question mark.

The blonde superhero hadn't been seen since, though the boys were closely tracking him. Looters, gangs, anarchists - all sorts of crazy ran rampant while society was in its early recovery stages, and every few days, a news story would break of a busted heist or a van full of arrested ne'er-do-wells. If you watched the footage closely, the lime-green question marks were hard to miss.

As politicians returned to politics and the rest of the world began to crawl out from the trenches of war, the boys could breathe easy as the smoggy fumes of Cartman's reign began to blow away. Life was slowly returning to normal.

x.x.x

On break from the day's attempt at cleaning up the schoolyards, which were untouched since Cartman's raid, where so many of their classmates were captured or gunned down, Stan took a walk over to the South Park cemetery. Thanks and donations were pouring in from across the globe, and the first place the money went was to the graveyards, making sure that the first victims of the war were properly honored.

The noirette gave a sigh as he looked out at the sea of white marble crosses (and the one Star of David for the Brovflovskis). With nothing but their wits and the clothes on their backs, the initial graves were pathetic. They were made of wood, whatever scrap the boys could manage when they could afford to peek their heads out. Not to mention, there were only four. Jimmy Valmer, Timmy Burch, Kyle Broflovski, and Wendy Testaburger. The only four they knew for sure were killed that day. Obviously, they couldn't be more wrong.

The tides had certainly shifted, and the sight of the white sea forced a glimmer of a smile onto Stan's worn face. The innocent civilians of South Park finally had their proper memorials, while Cartman was the one laying in an unmarked ditch.

Only three of the original four graves remained, and they stayed together, right in the empty patch of dying flowers where they were put the first time. Stan beelined towards the trio every time he dared to step foot in the graveyard, usually with a bouquet of flowers or a pink knit hat in hand. Today, he had both.

Wendy's grave was the easiest to spot. In the sea of crosses, Wendy's was a towering angel, hands folded over her heart and wings extended proudly. The feathery details were constantly hung with golden chains and paper leis, all gifts from any townsfolk who stopped by and knew the story; knew the brave sacrifice of a young lady in a purple pea coat.

Stan first placed the bouquet of wildflowers at the statue's base, sitting it down in a patch of fallen petals from his last visit. Wendy loved flowers, especially the bright, vibrant colors of wildflowers.

Once the flowers were down, he turned to the pink knit hat. Ever since Cartman's insanity began, the pink knit hat was his catalyst. It was the reminder to wake up every morning and fight like there was no tomorrow. It hung above his mirror, egging him on every time he entered his bedroom (which had since returned to Kyle, at least partially - the boys were bunkmates now). It was Wendy's spirit, beckoning down from the heavens. And every moment of every day, it brought the same message: give Cartman HELL.

"I did it, Wendy," Stan said softly, trying to hold back tears. It was a foreign sensation to the war-hardened teen, who never had time for crying and emotion while holding together La Resistance. Even before the takeover, he hated crying in front of Wendy; he was the man, it was his job to be the rock.

He gave a weak smile. Then again, she always appreciated a man with sensitivity. It was their love of activism and making the world a better place that brought them together, right? "I know the world's not perfect yet, but it's getting better. This is the time. We can fix things, just like we always wanted."

He wiped his eyes with his sleeve. "I'm going to make the world perfect for you, Wendy. Just like I always promised I would."

Stan had full intention of keeping his promise, especially now that the hard part was over. So, with shaky hands and teary eyes, the noirette stepped up on the gravestone's base, then reached up and placed the knit hat up on top of the angel's head. He had been holding onto it for far too long; it was time he gave it back to its owner.

While up on the base, Stan pressed his forehead to the angel's, as if embracing the moment as the closest he would ever be to the love of his life again. "I love you, Wendy."

After a long pause, he wrenched himself away and returned to the schoolyards.

The rebuilding process would be long and hard, but for once in what felt to be ages, things were finally looking up.

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><p><em>Yay, another story down! :D Thank you guys SO much for all of your support during this story's run - I'll definitely miss all of the Favorite Stories alerts pummeling my phone after the new chapter goes up. XD Readers, reviewers, favers and all, thanks so much for everything! I really hope you enjoyed!<br>_

_I can't promise when I'll be back to the South Park boards, but I will someday, so keep your eyes out! (Or, if you've got some other fandoms in your heart, give me a watch and see what else I've got running! Totally not a shameless plug or anything, but.)  
><em>

_Thanks again, guys! :)  
><em>

__**_§ Tucker's Mayflower, signing off! §_**__


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